-1Title: Once in a Moment

Rating: Teen to Mature

Summary: Troy makes new friends, Sharpay feels threatened.

Notes: Sorry for the delay, blame the Speed Racer fandom.

Warnings: Nothing serious this chapter

Disclaimer: I do not claim to own any of the High School Musical characters, plots or themes which are the direct property of Disney and their affiliates. Nor do I have any money in which to be sued with, considering I am a college student and I'd pay my student loans off before any lawsuit, so don't waste your time. However, any characters not recognizable to the two previously existing HSM movies are mine, and I will prosecute without prejudice if they pop up anywhere else without my permission.

Chapter Seven: The Evolution of Friendship

Troy had imagined the theater practices would be equivalent to spending time shopping with Sharpay. While he very much loved his girlfriend, and certainly thought getting to see her strut around in tight skirts and tighter shirts was a perk, the hours inbetween in which she fussed and was indecisive and berated him for not being more involved were hardly worth the thirty second fashion show afterwards. Shopping with Sharpay inevitably ended with her leaving him alone for hours in which she only reappeared towards the end of the day with a demand that he act like a gentleman and carry her bags, and him spending hours upon hours waiting for her to finish because he'd agreed to drive her. In fact the only real thing he liked about shopping with Sharpay was the knowledge that everything she put on, he would eventually get to take off later on. And occasionally she snuck him into her dressing room where they groped each other like the teenagers they were and stole kisses all the while trying not to attract the attention of the other shoppers. But those instances were few and far inbetween and shopping with Sharpay was likened to hell in his book. He'd really thought practices with Darbus would be on the same level.

He was surprised and delighted to find he actually enjoyed the practices. They met every Monday, Wednesday, Friday and every other Saturday in the afternoon and it wasn't unusual for Troy to find himself anticipating the practices so much he arrived sometimes twenty minutes early. Sharpay drove him on Saturdays, leaving him feeling guilty that he practiced basketball in the morning and the play at night leaving him little time for her, and she waited for him after school on Mondays and Wednesdays.

The fact of the matter was that Troy liked the cast. He liked that they were all fast friends and not afraid to give each other advice, or just talk. He liked the play, and memorizing his lines wasn't nearly as hard because of that. He even liked being around Gabriella, despite the initial tension that had manifested between them both as the romantically entwined leads. Before Sharpay, and even before he'd started dating Gabriella, they had been friends, and he'd missed their friendship. He knew he'd wronged her, that he'd lied and nearly destroyed her heart, and the fact that she was willing to slowly but surely let him back into her life was a miracle.

Being in the play made him happy, happier than he'd thought he could be, happier than he had been before and knew musicals and the theater would be a part of his life for as long as he lived.

"It's a rush of emotion," he told Sharpay one Sunday afternoon. He'd managed to convince her to go with him to baseball game between the local triple A team and their division rivals. "It's nice to be someone different for a change. To not have the same kind of problems or have to deal with the same kind of pressures. No one expects anything more than what you can honestly give on the stage, and it isn't like that a whole lot in real life."

They were standing in line at the concession stand, Sharpay's arm looped through his loosely and dark sunglasses hiding her eyes from the intense sunlight. "I know, Troy," she told him in an exasperated tone.

"No, Shar, you don't. You haven't been on stage before. You've go no idea the kind of rush it is, but you gotta try it."

"Next time," she agreed. "You and me as the leads."

"We'll be the best," he assured her, then moved the both of them up to the counter. "Want anything?" he asked her. They'd had a bit of a rushed morning, with him oversleeping from staying up the past night working on homework he hadn't been able to finish due to the play practice running so late, and Sharpay generally not being a morning person. Neither of them had taken the time to grab more than toast before rushing off to purchase tickets for the game.

Sharpay raised an eyebrow at him visible even from behind the large sunglasses. "Greasy hamburger or fat soaked hot dog? Just get me a bottle of water."

"You sure?" he pinned her with a serious look. She could eat like the best of them, he'd seen her. She wasn't one for eating large amounts at once, but she snacked like crazy the entire day long, and she hardly ever passed up food, especially when he was buying.

She told him, "Troy, you're a guy and he spend most of the day running around and sweating. You can afford to eat this kind of food and not weight three hundred pounds. Unless they have a Caesar salad you can just get me the water."

He frowned. "Okay, how about we stop somewhere after and get something healthier to eat?" She shrugged and he turned to the counter to place his order. It was a legitimate claim by Sharpay, considering she never ate greasy things and the most exercise she liked to do was at the mall. He'd pick her up a wrap when they went home.

"Is everything okay with Gabriella?" Sharpay asked once they'd found their seats. She brushed a lock of hair back from her eyes, a telltale sign that she was nervous.

"She was good friend," he told Sharpay kindly, "and I want us to be friends again. But no one, and I mean no one, Sharpay, is ever going to replace you. I hope you didn't think all that stuff I've been sprouting off to my parents about wanting to marry you when we're older has been nothing but a load, because I intend to. We're both going to go to college, and be successful, but you're the only one I want to spent the rest of my life with."

"You can't fault me," she laughed, settling her hand over his. "You're starring with your ex girlfriend, and when you broke up it wasn't mutual. She'd get back together with you in a second."

Troy rolled his eyes. "I broke her heart. I doubt she wants to kiss me. Maybe gut me, but not kiss me."

Sharpay shook her head. "Troy, sometimes I wonder how dense you really are. You're a truly amazing person. You're selfless and caring, honest and sincere. Those aren't traits you find in any one person, and Gabriella isn't stupid. You broke her heart because she realized she was loosing the perfect guy to some girl who came out of no where. I'm sure Gabriella thought you guys were going to go off to college together, and then have a big, white wedding, and then you'd have fat babies, and grow old together. I took that way from her, and she may not say it because she's still hurting, but she'd give anything to have you back and to have that future back."

"I never meant to hurt her, but that future, that's the one I'm supposed to have with you. If it was supposed to be with her I wouldn't have fallen in love with you. I'm a strong believer in what's meant to be, and this is one of them."

Sharpay lifted her sunglasses off her face and leaned over to steal Troy's lips in a kiss. "You're a total sap, too," she added, then framed his jaw with her hand and proceeded with several displays of public affection.

Halfway through the forth inning Sharpay departed to use the bathroom and retouch her lip gloss and when she returned she found Troy not absorbed in the game like those around him, but with his cell phone attached to his ear, the kind of smile on his face that he usually only gave her.

"Who is it?" she asked, sliding into her seat.

He paused only briefly to gesture with his hands for a moment of silence, before returning to his call. Her eyes narrowed at the motion.

"That was Peter," Troy announced when he snapped his phone shut. "He wants to meet up for a group dinner."

Sharpay frowned. "Peter is," she paused for a moment, searching her memory, then responded, "he's from the play, right?"

To be truthful Sharpay stuck around after school on Mondays and Wednesdays until he was finished with his practice, but she didn't actually watch him, aside from the first couple times. Once her paranoia about Gabriella had passed, she'd started spending her time at the gym. She thought it was odd that she gravitated towards the gym while Troy moved towards the arts, but she went because there was almost always some kind of group activity going on, sometimes more than one, and she was trying her hardest to fit in. Already too many of the girls, and by default their boyfriends, disliked her, and Sharpay endeavored for once to be less selfish and try and make her stay easier for them all, which meant getting along with the student body.

Sometimes she sat cross legged in a semi circle with the crafts club and attempted to learn how to knit, and occasionally she hung out with the dance squad who encouraged her to try and pick up on their moves and try out the next semester. And recently she'd enjoyed learning volleyball and badminton, but staying in the theater and watching Troy enjoy something she could take no part in was too painful. She was glad for him, but she wanted what he had desperately, and she was afraid to stay and feel envious.

And so she only knew the members of the play vaguely, and only from what Troy mentioned of them (which was often, but useless as she learned to tune him out when he spoke of people she knew nothing about). Peter she was certain was Troy's understudy.

"I thought we had an agreement? You agreed we'd play vintage board games tonight if I went with you to the ballgame this afternoon. I know board games aren't exactly the most exciting thing, but Ryan loves them and he's feeling really lonely right now, so we're supposed to be making an effort to be there for him." It was Sunday, the only full day they ever had to themselves, and that meant they spent it together no matter what.

"I know, Shar," Troy said, fisting his phone. "But everyone has such hectic schedules it's rare to get a time when we can all get together outside of practice. Ryan can wait one more day, I don't think the whole gang can get together again for a few more weeks."

"It's not about who can wait and who can't," she told him angrily. "Ryan is close to leaving, Troy, unless he feels like he has a support system that he can rely on to get him through whatever he and Sam are going through. I know I told you that I'd stay even if Ryan left, but that's not the point. This is my brother, and you made a promise to him, even more, you made a promise to me."

Troy sighed. "How about Ryan comes with us tonight? We'll play board games next week and all of us will go out tonight."

"Ryan and I don't know who Peter or any of those other kids are. We'd feel uncomfortable."

"That's why you have to come," Troy argued. "I really like my new friends, and I want you to like them too. If you guys get to know each other, then you won't feel uncomfortable, and you'll get to be friends too."

With a soft shake Sharpay stood. "You go out with your new friends, Troy, I'm going to keep my word and spent it at home with Ryan. He needs to know that at least someone care about him and won't just put him off because he's in need of emotional comfort." She turned then, leaving Troy behind, even as she hard him call after her to stop.

He caught up with her at the car, grabbing her upper arm and wrenching her around. "What's your problem?"

"Nothing!" she jerked her arm free. "Look, I'm not feeling so good. The humidity is high today. I'd like to go home and lay down for a while if that's okay with you, then you can go hang out with your new friends."

He pressed her back against the car with an angry expression. "You swore to me," he seethed, "that you would never make me choose."

"I'm not," she denied venomously, "you do whatever you want, Bolton. You go hang out with your new friends for all I care. I do recognize that you have a life outside of me. Do whatever you want. You don't need it, but you have my permission. What's the problem?"

"It's your tone, Sharpay. That's the tone I get from you when you're pissed and you're implying that I'm at fault, which I fail to see at the moment. All I'm trying to do is hang out with some friends that I won't get to see as a whole for a while, and you're making it seem like I'm guilty of some capital offence."

Sharpay shoved him off of her. "You just can't make plans and break them for better ones. Ryan and I aren't a package deal, but he's my brother, and if you don't care about him, what does that say about me?"

"It's just a board game!"

She pinned him with an icy glare. "It really isn't. Take me home."

Troy knew all relationship had their ups and down, especially those between teenagers, but as he drove Sharpay home he couldn't help but wonder why theirs was so rocky. They had overcome so much, and persevered through conditions that adults would have faltered over, but it seemed they had just as many downs as ups as a couple, and he was so very tired of fighting with her over the little things. She was temperamental, and he was stubborn and while he loved her, he wondered how much strain they could take.

"Do you want me to come over tonight?" he asked her when he pulled up in front of her house.

She slammed the door.

"Pick you up tomorrow then?" he tried instead.

"It's a Monday," she reminded him, "I'd rather get my own ride. I don't have time to wait for you to be finished with your new friends."

"You'd deny me friends other than you?" he demanded. "That's pretty selfish of you."

Sharpay leaned in the rolled down window of the passenger side of his car. "No, Troy, the problem is I can't deny you anything."

"What's that supposed to mean?"

She shrugged. "Nothing. I just wish you'd understand. We don't all make friends as easily as you. People are judgmental and mean and we aren't all as easily accepted."

"I know that look on your face," Ryan said when she entered their house. He learned against the doorway to his room. "Trouble in paradise?"

"Shut up," she snapped, then slammed her door. She didn't emerge for the rest of the night.

The following morning her stomach hurt, though she was sure because she missed Troy and she'd spent the night realizing what a fool she'd made of herself. She had been wrong to deny her boyfriend new friends, especially when she saw how happy they made him. They couldn't take her place, and he still cared deeply for her, and so her jealousy (because she recognized it for what it was) was sheer stupidity.

"He loves you," Ryan told her as they sat on a picnic bench waiting for the first bell to ring. "You only had to tell him you were feeling left out."

With her arms crossed on the table and her face buried in them, her voice was muffled as she said, "It's been a long time since I felt left out by someone I really loved."

Ryan rubbed her back soothingly. "You're human, Sharpay, and you're territorial. I've shared enough bathrooms with you to know that much. When you feel like something you love is going to be taken away, be it your space or your boyfriend, you get angry. I would've understood if he wanted to hang out with his other friends. I'm going to be depressed and emo and moody for who knows how long, but he's right about getting that large of a group of friends together at once."

"I don't want to be replaced," she said. "And I know I'm not, but I feel that way."

"I told you, Shar," Troy's voice came from over Ryan's shoulder, "no one ever takes your place. I usually don't like having to repeat myself, but in this case I'll make an acceptation."

Ryan moved to the other side of the picnic table as Troy sat down next to Sharpay.

"You know we gotta fix this, right?" Troy asked her.

She pulled her head up from her arms, her face pale. "How?"

Troy sighed and leaned over to press his shoulder against hers. "First off, I'm going to keep my commitments, be they to you or Ryan. You were right about that. It doesn't matter what the situation is, if a man makes a promise, he has to keep it or it's nothing but a reflection of the honor and respect he has or doesn't have for himself."

Across the table Ryan smiled faintly.

"Second, how about we work on slowly integrating you and me and all of our friends. I get that we're not all going to get along, and sometimes people just aren't meant to be friends, but I worked really hard to make two sets of people work when you were my new friend, and I want the same here. I want us to try, so even if it doesn't work out, I know that I gave it a chance."

"Thirdly?"

Troy bumped his head softly against hers. "And yes, thirdly, I'm going to remind you every day, no matter what, that you're not going anywhere in my heart."

Ryan gave a huff of annoyance and rested his chin on his palm. "Why can't I get a guy who knows how to suck it up and apologize whether he's wrong or not?"

Sharpay ignored her brother a pressed a chaste kiss to the corner of Troy's mouth. "I'm still learning," she admitted, "and it's hard because I'm not used to sharing. It's hard to love someone so much and let them drift away on faith alone that they're coming back. I've had to hold onto everything in my life with my nails. It's not that I don't trust you, I just get scared."

"Troy," Ryan pointed out with a grin, "she's already the ball and chain. Run for the hills."

Sharpay thrust a finger at him. "Keep talking, brother of mine, and you'll find yourself uninvited to the wedding. Imagine, all those cute boys in tuxedos and you barred from the event."

Troy interjected, "Hey, hey, lets not be hasty. A wedding isn't coming anytime soon, right?"

Sharpay shrugged. "Never too early to start."

"Just think, Troy, all those pastels. So little time to coordinate them." Ryan stuck his tongue out at Sharpay when she swatted at him.

"I'll leave that to you," Troy said.

"Guys!"

Sharpay perked up as she saw the familiar forms of Kendall and Chad making their way over. She'd hadn't seen either recently.

"What's up?" Troy asked them, easily swinging Sharpay's bag over his shoulder as the first bell rang.

"Well, it's been a while since we did something, right?" Kendall demanded. "So I saw Chad here in the hall and we decided to organize something."

"Bowling?" the African-American suggested. "You know, this time without the drama."

Ryan huffed, "Drama sticks to us like a bad rash."

"Sure," Troy said.

Sharpay bit her lip for a moment then asked Troy, "You want to invite any of your friends from the play?"

Troy pressed a kiss to her forehead. "Thanks for asking, but how about it's just us this time?"

In the distance Ryan spotted Sam. "Just us?" he asked faintly.

Kendall shrugged. "I invited Sam, he was there last time, but if you don't want him to go I can come up with something--"

"No," Ryan interjected. "I think I'm going to be busy. Sorry." He shouldered his backpack and disappeared off to class.

"I knew it was bad," Kendall said.

Chad shook his head. "Try being a team with Sam when he's angry and he has an inflated and hard ball he can throw very strongly at your head."

"This has to stop," Sharpay said, eyes trailing after her brother's departed form. "Sam is hurting him so much."

Troy watched Sam's form carefully, noting the dark expression on his teammate's face. "He's not the only one being hurt," Troy said softly.